Convenia®

[alexia642]

Originally Posted by eculbert

My newly adopted old lady cat had it, apparently Normal Saline would have worked better. No problem with her..luckily from what others have said. She had a MDR strain of bug and after I finally got a vet to C/S her, culture and sensitivity test, found out $$$ wasted. Now on a different med, first dose last evening, so no 'report' on it yet.

Why wont vets almost routinely do that test when the 'first' tried med doesn't work? Had to threaten to grab cat and run to lawyer to get them to do that.

So, first in response to this quote, I understand your frustrations as we in the veterinary field typically have the exact same frustration but in reverse. It is so uncommon for us to find owners who are willing to spend the time and money to allow us to send out C/S's that they are frequently not even offered. Most of the time, when we are presenting estimates and an option such as this is on there, I am either a. stared at dumbly, b. told that I am a money grubbing b***h, c. screamed at until I leave the room, d. actually physically assaulted, or e. told that I am insane. It is rare that we get owners with enough stability in their lives to be able to do such options. This is a fault with veterinary medicine in general. We are typically expected to "just know what's wrong" and give the medicine now.

I also am new to this thread of thought about convenia. It is still a fairly new drug in our world, but it is very commonly used (especially in emergency medicine for how many abscesses we see). I have not once seen an adverse reaction to the drug myself, but was confronted with a phone call from a concerned owner the other morning describing the symptoms listed on this forum the other morning. I decided to research myself as none of my other co-workers had any experience with any side-effects of the sort either. I would like to point out that we have to keep in mind that while these side-effects (while quite horrid) may seem common as they are all on here from different people, we must think about the fact that this drug is given to innumerable cats each day who do not have these side-effects. I will, however, continue to look into this matter, as I have cats myself and love them dearly.